The website for Yuzu, a small Japanese restaurant in Manchester, carries an intriguing message. They will not serve sushi, it says, because that has "to be made by a properly trained sushi master, which we are not". Oh for a world of restaurants which recognise all the things they cannot adequately do. Imagine all the great sauces that would not be screwed up. No more would we be tortured by the promise of a classic dish only to receive an approximation made by someone who had never tasted the real thing. The world, or at least the hungry one I inhabit, would be a better place.

All that said, the menu at Yuzu in Manchester is not a diverting read. Unless you had been reassured in advance, you might look up from its laminated pages to whoever had dragged you to this small, high-ceilinged blond-wood space in Chinatown – it feels like eating inside an elegant, well-lit wardrobe – and frown. What's so special? There are gyoza and chicken kara-age. There is tempura. There is sashimi. It is an unremarkable set of dishes. Then again I would much prefer to be served one unoriginal dish done very well indeed, than 10 failed attempts at innovation. Yuzu does what it knows how to do very well indeed. That's what's special.

There is so much to love about this place, starting with the music. As we sat down the breathy moaning trumpet of Miles Davis on Kind of Blue was floating out across the narrow space. They kept up a mix of Coltrane and Davis all night. I found myself wondering whether a great taste in music could be taken as sign of great taste generally. And if merely raising this thought means that, from here on in, restaurateurs fire up the Miles Davis playlist on Spotify every time they see me, I'll regard that as an easy win. Even if the food's crap the music will be a compensation.

Yuzu's execution of classics is spot on. The pork gyoza are glorious pouches made with the best slippery silken casings which have proper bite. They enclose a fresh bolus of meat and vegetables with just a little stock. You think you can hear the steam giving a gentle sigh as you bite in, until you realise you are the one sighing. The chicken kara-age makes all other fried chicken look like a first draft, the salty crunch continuing far beyond what feels decent. Chicken yakitori can too often be cheap scraps of tensed, knackered hen, disguised with a bucket of sauce. These smokey, grilled pieces feel like they are what the bird died for.

Sashimi changes depending upon what is available in the market. It is served in a bowl, "don" style on top of just-warm lightly vinegared rice. Today, the kaisen don brings salmon, sticky slices of scallop and sweet translucent prawn. I can think of places in London which would ask for the deeds to your house for a serving like this; here it is £14.50 for the very best stuff. Do I need tell you about the unimpeachable quality of their greaseless tempura?

'I can think of places in London which would ask for the deeds to your house for a serving this like': Yuzu's sashimi kaisen don. Photograph: Christopher Thomond for the Observer

There is a special tonight – a whole sea bream. It is grilled, a little salt applied to its skin. And that's it: a whole fish on a plate with, on the side, a small jug of soy, with an uncommon softness and subtlety. We fillet it from the bone and pour the soy over the lightly steaming tranches of white flesh. If there is a more perfect way to eat a fish I am yet to meet it and shake it by the tail. Only pork yaki udon – thick, wheat flour noodles to be slurped away – misses the mark and even then, not by much. The slices of pork fillet are still tender, but the whole is just a little bland. It is the minor fault that points up the brilliance of everything else; of a restaurant sticking to what it does best.

We drink beer, and a glass of saki cloudy with yuzu juice and settle a bill that redefines the word "reasonable". It is that best, most understated kind of special.